How WWE 14 will look if develop by GTA V developer Rockstar Games

Next week THQ is Auctioning off their Assessts, including The WWE
License, What if GTA V developer Rockstar Games picked it up?. Here is a
small fan-made video footage showing just a glimpse of how WWE 14 will
look if develop by GTA V developer Rockstar Games.

THQ's
assests are up for sale on Tuesday to the highest bidder, so we should
find out by Wednesday if THQ will keep the license for WWE '14 or
another company will be picking it up.
If THQ indeed decide to sell WWE franchise license, which studio
should pick it up, Rockstar Games, EA Sports, Ubisoft or any other?. Let
us know your views to us in the comment section below.
Enjoy the fan-made footage below:

Source: Gamepur

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12 Fashion Forward Tech Accessories at CES

These are one of the many creative and beautiful tech accessories in the wild last week at the 2013 International CES conference in Las Vegas. hope you like it.

1. The Case Purse

This iPhone cover from Bootcase also serves as a wallet and purse.

2. Memorex Speaker

This retro-styled speaker from Memorex allows you to wirelessly stream music in a cute package.

3. The Karl Case

A collection of Karl Lagerfeld cases are for those who want to show their affection for the high-end German fashion designer.

4. Fashionable Stickers

5. Two-Piece Smartphone

These iPhone cases from Patchworks are sleek and fun.

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Nokia Lumia 920

Design and build While we didn’t get a whole lot
of time with the phone, what we had was good enough to formulate a
solid first impression. Starting with the build and design, Nokia hasn’t
deviated too much from the first-gen Lumias. The basic form factor
remains pretty much the same as the 920 is carved out of a single block
of polycarbonate. This unibody approach makes it durable as there’s less
chance of anything snapping off if it falls. It is extremely well-built
and sturdy in your hands, albeit a bit chunky. This extra bit of heft
could be attributed to the image stabilisation used in the camera, so we
guess there was no avoiding it. At 185g, it’s very much manageable in
your hands, although it might get uncomfortable in your pocket. The size
is not a big deal either.

The 4.5-inch IPS display is nothing short of amazing. Due to the
high pixel per inch count (332ppi), it is ‘Retina-grade’ and images and
text look sharp and vivid. The display is also super sensitive, more
than usual, so even the slightest gestures are easily picked up. The
buttons are all placed where they should be and are within reach of your
thumb. It’s good that Nokia decided to place the power button on the
side as placing it on top would have been uncomfortable.

The phone is powered by a 1.5GHz Qualcomm SoC (MSM8960) which
doesn’t do much for the UI but helps in image and video processing. The
interface is smooth for the most part, but the stutter bug will pay you a
visit occasionally. This could just be an issue with the pre-sale unit
or WP8 itself; we’ll know for sure once the phone is officially launched
here. The 920 does not have expandable storage, so you’ll have to make
do with the 32GB onboard memory.

The Camera Next, let’s dive straight into
the one feature that everyone’s raving about – the PureView camera. This
time, the PureView title refers to the optical image stabilisation
onboard rather than the 41MP sensor. Nokia calls it floating lens
technology, where the camera lens actually balances on a bunch of
springs so it can compensate for user movement. That coupled with a
large aperture value of f/2.0 and we’re looking at some pretty god
low-light shots. Let’s head straight to the samples.

This was taken in the corner of our labs with very low ambient
light. Even with the flash off, the Lumia 920 will fire it while
focussing and then capture the image. The result is pretty remarkable as
you can see, however, there was this minute blur that we simply
couldn’t get rid of, no matter how steady our hands were.

Has huge potential After spending about an hour
with the handset, we must say that the Lumia 920 has huge potential when
it launches in India next month. Nokia is still tight lipped about the
pricing, but we'd guess it would be anything between Rs 35,000 to Rs
40,000. The device is built like a tank and the finish and choice of
materials easily rivals the top dogs like the One X and even the iPhone
5. The hardware is all there and now all that’s left is for the software
platform to mature, and fast. Apps are always going to be the deciding
factor between platforms, which could offset the sales of the 920 in the
start. But even without apps, the Lumia 920 is a good phone and has
some powerful imaging capabilities. There are plenty of features in the
920 that we still need to put to the test once we get our hands on a
retail unit, but for now, we feel that the Lumia 920 has potential for
greatness.

Source: Tech2

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GTA V PC in development, 10 Hidden Evidence Confirms

At present Rockstar Games has only announced Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V)
for PS3 and Xbox 360. The firm is keeping quiet on PC version of most
anticipated game of 2013 (GTA V). However this hasn't stopped one eager
GTA series fan from rounding up 10 separate bits of evidence suggesting
GTA V for PC will happen indeed sometime in near future.

Here
is what GTA Forums user "S1LV3R_W0LF" said about his finding, "Ok first
of all I wanna make clear that I know there are some threads about GTAV
PC, and also there was a lot of topics about rumors. But the purpose of
my thread is not to talk about rumors or to talk about if there is or
not a version or to be transformed in another useless debate/ flame war
with consoles.

These are all facts, that I mentioned before but
that people miss, because they hardly read the whole threads and this
time I'll post all the sources of these informations, instead of just
listing them. So I think once and for all I should make this thread that
originated a few articles on the Internet on websites I didn't even
knew with the list I made but that many people questioned because there
were no facts to support it, ok here we go:"

Check out HERE, a total of 10 Evidence which confirms that GTA V PC will indeed happen in near future.

Few
of these evidence are pretty weak, but taking into consideration all
the facts mention, this indeed makes a pretty compelling case.

Do you agree with all these evidence listed by "S1LV3R_W0LF"?. Let us know your views to us in the comment section below.

source: Gamepur

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Confirmed: Fallout 4 Leak Details are FAKE FAKE FAKE

Fallout 4 details are FAKE, the reddit user (GNR_Informant) himself
admitted. According to the recent update posted by the user on Reddit,
he has not proof (about all the Fallout 4 details leaked) because it was
all LIE.

First and foremost, the game will take place in Boston, and be kind of a direct sequel to Fallout 3 with a few groups returning.

From what it sounds like, “The
Institute” is pretty much the downtown DC or New Vegas of this game.
Boston is going to be unlike anything we’ve seen in a Fallout game
before, with buildings more on par with cyberpunk and retro-futurism.

Androids play a big part in this
game. The railroad from Fallout 3 is a faction. The enemies of the
railroad is “the Plantation” — a group who force Androids to farm so
that Humans can get food. The Institute is highly advanced and probably
obtained or built their own GECK to start a farm.

Due to complaints about using Super
Mutants and the Brotherhood of Steel in Fallout 3 excessively and going
against the lore too much, Bethesda has decided to avoid using these
groups. Bethesda wants to make a new “race” (think Ghoul, Super Mutant)
which will be central to Boston. Bethesda is currently looking at
Lovecraftian fiction since Boston is around “Lovecraft Country”.

Bethesda has no plans to reinvent
the leveling up system to make it more like Skyrim and want to make
Fallout 4 more distinct from Skyrim since of the complaints that
Oblivion and Fallout 3 were too similar. Bethesda is thinking about
introducing a system, similar to Skyrim, where your skills can level up
if you perform certain tasks.

source: Gamepur

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Gorgeous Looking New GTA V Screenshots Released

Rockstar Games has released some brand new screenshots of the most
awaited game of 2013, "Grand Theft Auto V (GTA V)". The game is schedule
to arrive in Spring 2013 for PS3 and Xbox 360, PC port of the game is
not yet officially announced.

Trouble
taps on your window again with this next chapter in the Grand Theft
Auto universe, set in the city of Los Santos and its surrounding hills,
countryside and beaches.
A bold new direction in open-world freedom, storytelling,
mission-based gameplay and online multiplayer, Grand Theft Auto V
focuses on the pursuit of the almighty dollar in a re-imagined,
present-day Southern California.

Check out brand new screenshots below.

1 comments:

“Now” App Scans Instagram To Find You Something Fun To Do Nearby

You’re bored at home asking “What should I do?” Meanwhile people nearby are shooting Instagrams of the fun events they’re at. Now is a free iOS app
that uses Instagram’s API to sort through photos in real-time, organize
those from the same time and place into events, and show you the events
as a feed. Now harnesses the powerful Instagram API to help you
discover parties, concerts, bar nights, and share them too.
French developer Ben Broca bootstrapped Now
into existence last year, and it’s been gaining steam with its recent
2.0 update that made it accessible worldwide. Now employs an intelligent
combination of programmatic photo processing and human curation to give
users an accurate look at what’s going on around them.
First Now uses Instagram’s API to suck in all the photos taken nearby
and clumps them together by time and location. Now super users then
read the photo captions, choose the best shots, and organize them into
categorized and titled events. This lets Now determine that 20 people
posting photos of a musician with the caption “Shuggie Otis” at West
16th and 9th Ave in New York is actually a concert for Shuggie Otis at
the Highline Ballroom.
Events
with the most photos and likes bubble to the top of your feed. Click
through one to check out all the photos shot there. You can also filter
the Now feed to see only music, art, parties, food, outdoors, or other
types of events. And if you’re feeling some wanderlust, you can drag the
map to anywhere in the world and search to see what’s going on in
Tokyo, Rio, or rural Slovakia.
Now also lets you share experiences with the app’s community and your
social networks. Just select a nearby place, choose to include photos
taken their by other people or insert your own, add a description, and
post away. You can follow other Now’ers to keep up with their
adventures.
In the future, Broca hopes Now can make sure you don’t miss cool
things in your neighborhood. It’s considering notifications of
especially popular events nearby, and it has an email newsletter
highlighting top venues. A clear route to monetization that Broca is
considering would let even promoters pay for sponsored placement in the
Now feed.
For
the moment, though, Broca is just happy Instagram is so generous with
its photos, “I think a lot of people underestimate the Instagram API. We
were surprised at how powerful it is.” He says most apps built on it
just recreate the Instagram experience on the web, and don’t actually do
anything unique, but Now focuses on “the real-time photos API that
gives you every photo in a geographic area. We use it in a smarter way
to show you interesting information about those photos.”
Instagram itself is doing some innovative things with its data set,
like beefing up its “trending tab”, adding a photo map, and creating
galleries of popular hashtags. But Broca doesn’t think the company will
ever get too serious about events, leaving room for Now.
And as for Instagram’s owner Facebook’s influence on the future of
its sweet API? Broca simply says, “I hope they don’t change it too
much.”

Source: TechCrunch

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Check out iHome focuses on Lightning, Bluetooth, and fitness

iHome makes so many different audio products
that even the PR people have a hard time keeping them straight. The new
lineup introduced at CES is no exception, and here for your enjoyment
are some highlights from my personal tour of the company’s 2013
products.

Lightning docks

The $150 iDL100 is a triple-charging stereo clock radio with dual Lightning docks—one an iPhone
or iPod touch, the other for and iPad or iPad mini—plus a USB port to
connect older iOS devices (or even a third Lightning-based product if
you’ve got on). You can charge and play music from any of the
devices—there’s even an auxiliary jack for playing from other
hardware—and you can set multiple alarms to wake you to music or
playlists from your devices or from the built-in FM radio.A step down is
the $100 iDL45, which is basically the same product but with a single
Lightning dock instead.

Bluetooth speakers

iHome’s $200 iBT44 is a follow-up to 2011’s iP4 boombox-styled
dockable speaker. But this time around, it’s all about Bluetooth, which
lets you wirelessly stream music from iOS, Android,
or other Bluetooth-enabled hardware. (The dock slot is still there, but
now just as a place to rest your weary portable device.) It runs on six
D batteries or wall power, features a five-band EQ, and comes with a
magnetic remote that gloms onto the metal front so you won’t lose it. iBT44
The iBT30 is a Bluetooth version of the company’s iW3 AirPlay
speaker. Like the iW3, the iBT30 is a rechargeable speaker that sits
atop it charging base. Stream your music to it wirelessly and then you
can just pick it up and move it around the house until the battery runs
out. It also includes an auxiliary jack for direct playback and a USB
port to charge one of your devices.
The $80 iBT20 is a Bluetooth clock radio that also includes a USB
charging port. It’s got an FM radio built-in with six presets, SRS
TruBass for better sound, and a backup battery to make sure your alarm
goes off even when your power goes out. iBT20

Headphones

The $100 iB85 are Bluetooth headphones with a built-in mic and on-ear
remote control functions. They feature a padded headband and ear
cushions, charge via a Micro-USB connection, and fold up for better
portability (especially using the included travel pouch). iB85
The $20 iB10 sport earhooks with “cord cruncher” cable designed for
active (read: exercising) audio lovers. These are fairly standard earbud
with sport hooks to keep them from falling off while running and the
like. The neat (or gimmicky, depending on your point of view) feature is
the retracting, sheathed cable that prevents tangles and limits cable
length for when you, say, have your player in an arm band. iB10
source – letlearn

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Comment Samsung Says It Will Not Release Its Windows RT Tablet In The U.S.

Samsung’s Windows RT tablet, the Ativ Tab, will not be sold in
the U.S. Mike Abary, head of Samsung’s PC and tablet business in the
U.S., told CNET
at CES that his company shelved the release because its retail partners
do not see enough demand. (Abary did not specify if the Ativ Tab will
be launched in non-U.S. markets).
The Ativ Tab is powered by Qualcomm chips, and the announcement
comes, rather unfortunately, just days after Microsoft CEO Steve
Ballmer, with an Ativ Tab on hand, joined Qualcomm Chief Executive Paul
Jacobs during his CES keynote address to extol their partnership.
Abary also said that the amount of investment it would take to
educate consumers about the benefits of Windows RT was another factor.
As he told CNET:

There wasn’t really a very clear positioning of what
Windows RT meant in the marketplace, what it stood for relative to
Windows 8, that was being done in an effective manner to the consumer.
When we did some tests and studies on how we could go to market with a
Windows RT device, we determined there was a lot of heavy lifting we
still needed to do to educate the customer on what Windows RT was. And
that heavy lifting was going to require pretty heavy investment. When we
added those two things up, the investments necessary to educate the
consumer on the difference between RT and Windows 8, plus the modest
feedback that we got regarding how successful could this be at retail
from our retail partners, we decided maybe we ought to wait.

This is another step back for Windows RT, which is floundering in the
face of competition from Windows 8 and Android tablets, and may be dealt a further blow
once Intel Atom Bay Trail tablets are released later this year. Abary
said, however, that Samsung may reconsider Windows RT devices if a
strong enough market develops.

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How to Hack Your Brain

You are not who you think you are. Your personality and identity is significantly more malleable than you realize. With a few simple tricks, you can exploit your brain's innate functionality to change just about anything about yourself. Here's how.

You Are Not Necessarily the Person You Think You Are

You
are not who you are, but rather the product of many influences. The
saying "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" exists for a reason: the
longer you've been the person you think you are, the harder it becomes
to change. The thing is, you can dramatically change who you
are. It's actually not so much that it's difficult to change, but that
you've developed patterns and habits that make it easier to do things
the way you do them. Trying something in a new way can feel very
awkward, it will be generally less efficient by virtue of being
something new to you, and it often lacks excitement for you when it
involves giving up the comfort associated with your way.
That's
not to say you aren't born with some inherent abilities, but most of
what you consider part of your identity is a product of influence. While
we don't know the exact ratio of nature to nurture, there is
undoubtedly a combination of both that makes us who we are. We have a
tendency to think that change is difficult, but it's really just a
matter of changing your influence. You're probably familiar with Stockholm syndrome-the
term used to describe how hostage victims tend to develop positive
feelings towards their captors. Stockholm syndrome isn't a kind of
brainwashing by the captor; instead, the victim adapts to the
poor situation he or she is in. If most people can adapt to something as
awful as being kidnapped, most people can adapt to smaller positive
changes in their own lives. You can even make enormous changes if you're
willing to put in the work and you provide yourself with the proper
influences. We're going to look at how to do that on high and low
levels, from priming your brain to manipulating your own emotions, and
also look at how your environment and the people you know shape your
life.
Most of these methods won't make you feel comfortable, and,
at times, they may sound a bit crazy, but it is possible to "hack" your
own brain. Here are just a few ways to do it.

Priming Your Brain

Priming
is a ridiculously simple technique because all it involves is talking
to yourself. On the dull end of the spectrum, it's similar to
self-affirmation. On the crazier end of the spectrum, it bears some
similarities with neuro-linguistic programming. Priming your brain involves reciting a given set of words that are designed to alter your mindset. It is not
brainwashing and it cannot make you do anything you don't want to do.
What it can accomplish, however, is putting you into a state of mind
that will be more useful to you with a given situation or task.Before we get into the specifics of how to prime your brain, let's talk about how and why it works. If you were to say the word mustard
out loud, and then you were to see a portion of the word later, you'd
be reminded of mustard. For example, if you were to say "I must have
this" you might be reminded of mustard because of the word must. If you
were hungry and liked mustard, you may even want some. It's the same
phenomenon that compels you to buy a particular brand of shampoo that
you saw on television even if you 1) don't remember seeing the
commercial, and 2) couldn't care less what kind of shampoo you use. This
is essentially how priming works, and it's all thanks to your memory.
While
you're not going to remember everything you say, that doesn't mean what
you say is gone forever. While everything stored in your recent memory
may not be immediately accessible, all you really need to bring
something up is a trigger word. This is conceptually similar to using acronyms as a memory tool (e.g. Roy G. Biv)
but isn't designed to help you actually remember anything. Instead, the
goal is to place common words that, when apart, have no real specific
value, but when together, have an associative value that make you think
of happy things, sad things, specific people, or ambition. If any of
those common words come up again later in the day, you'll immediately
associate that word with the associative value of the group. Here's an
example:

drive

do

go

make

objective

important

create

commitment

purpose

enthusiasm

eager

motivation

This
is a list of words synonymous with or related to ambition. It's
designed to be read aloud to put you in a more ambitious mindset,
focusing your thoughts and priming your brain to react ambitiously when
these words, or portions of these words, come up later in your day.
Another exercise involves taking a shorter list of priming words and making a sentence with it. Here's an example:

the

smiled

looked

girl

and

These
words can form the sentence "the girl looked and smiled," which should
bring to mind pleasant associations for most people. Constructing
sentences out of word lists (which you can create yourself) can help put
you in the right mindset.
These two methods can be used to prime
your brain. They are not magic tricks that will instantly make you feel
happy, ambitious, or whatever, but they can help to provide you with
the mindset you need to better accomplish your daily tasks.
For more reading on priming, and a look at some really interesting studies, don't forget to check out the references for this article.

Using Your Emotions

If you've ever found yourself making out-of-character decisions based
on your emotional state—such as binging on ice cream after a breakup—you
know how easily your feelings can overtake your actions. Rather than
letting your emotions lead you towards poor judgment and irrational
behavior, however, you can learn to compensate for different emotional
states and to fabricate emotions to alter your mood. In order to do that
you need to, simply put, get in touch with your feelings. The idea
isn't so much to cry into a pillow about your wasted childhood, but
understand what you're feeling when you're feeling it, what the root
cause is, and what you can do about it. We're going to take a look at
how you can dissect your emotional state to use it to your advantage,
and also look at how you can fabricate emotion to change how you're
feeling.

Take an Acting Class

You
can't really control your emotions if you don't understand them, and
one of the best ways to understand them is to take an acting class. To
some this may sound fun, and to others this may sound like hell. Love it
or hate it, acting lessons are one of the best ways to explore how and
why you feel certain things. Your goal should be to find a class that
will make you uncomfortable every time you go. In my experience, any
class teaching the Meisner technique
is very effective if you put a lot of effort into the exercises. It can
be slow, tedious, and uncomfortable, but it's capable of bringing out
emotion you might not realize you had.

Make Yourself Uncomfortable

Your
emotions aren't in full force if you're not really doing anything, so
you need to put yourself in uncomfortable situations in order to bring
them out. This doesn't mean you should make yourself feel horrible, but
that you should go out and do things that you might resist because
you're worried about the downsides. Meeting new people is something that
makes most people uncomfortable, and it's a great place to start,
especially if it's a first date. Try new things that scare you. If you
notice you're glued to the couch and don't want to get up, do the
opposite. Spend time with people you don't like. Go to a movie you're
sure you'll hate. Your experiences won't always be pleasant, but they
should incite emotion that you can later analyze and better understand.

Keep Track of How You Feel

Like
an abbreviated diary, every time you have an emotional reaction to
something, write it down. You don't need much detail, but just a
sentence or two noting the emotion you're experiencing and the
(possible) cause. For example, I get extremely irritable when I'm
hungry. I will lose my temper far more easily when I'm hungry, so
whenever I notice myself thinking irrational (and sometimes hateful)
things, I always remind myself that I'm just hungry, I'll eat in a
minute, and the "asshole" who accidentally missed the garbage can and
didn't notice is mostly a result of my frustrated stomach. Until I
started to pay attention, I never really noticed that I was a jerk
whenever I was hungry. Instead, I just thought I was a jerk. This is a
simple example, but the point is this: pay attention to how you feel and
the other issues currently present, and you'll find it much easier to
manage your negative emotions.

Emote in Front of the Mirror

Fabricating
emotion is difficult. Once you understand your emotions you'll find it a
bit easier, but it helps to be able to recall how it feels, physically,
to emote. We all know how to smile, for example, but you can probably
count more fake smiles in family photographs than you can real ones. If
you don't know how to create an authentic smile (also known as the Duchenne smile), it will be very obvious to everyone around you.
The
easiest way to learn to fake expressions is to practice them in the
mirror. You can try them out to see what you look like and you'll
immediately know if they're passable or not. You'll also note that it
feels physically different to create an authentic-looking emotion than
it does to create a fake-looking emotion. For example, an authentic
smile shows more in the eyes than it does in your mouth. When someone
smiles a true smile, their eyes wrinkle (creating "crows feet") because a
new musicle—the orbicularis oculi muscle—is used. You'll come to remember this feeling and be able to replicate it away from the mirror after a little practice.
It's not necessarily easy to emote in front of the mirror,
but that's not as hard as you think. If your goal is simply to learn to
smile better, you'll get there if you just stare at yourself for awhile.
Eventually it will get so ridiculous that you'll have to laugh. If
you're less patient, you can try to make yourself laugh by making
strange faces or just being ridiculous. If you're comfortable, have a
friend over to help. For other emotions, you simply need to find a
source of that emotion and bring it into play in front of the mirror. If
you've employed any of the previously discussed techniques, you may
already have a reserve. Alternatively, watch a movie that makes you
laugh or cry and do it by the mirror. (Yes, this is absolutely a strange
thing to do, but it'll work.) If you're interested in anger, you should
have no problem getting there by just complaining to yourself or to a
friend on the phone.
Emoting in front of the mirror is going to
be strange and awkward at first, but after a few tries you'll get the
hang of it and be able to create authentic expressions on demand. These
expressions do surface from genuine emotion, so repeating them
can actually make you feel happier/sadder/angrier/etc. through
repetition. If you need to change your mood and your mindset, the
ability to fake it ‘til you make it is very, very useful.

Consider Your Health

Anything you do is much
easier if you're healthy—and that goes for mental as well as physical
health. These methods won't be terribly helpful if you're seriously
depressed. If you're not sleeping, eating well, and/or getting a
reasonable amount of physical activity in each day, you're going to find
them difficult as well. You can do pretty much everything better if you
take care of your mind and your body, so don't look at anything you've
read here as a panacea for the problems in your life. Everything here
assumes that you take reasonably good care of yourself and generally
start your day in a good place. If you're not feeling good on most days,
you need to take care of those problems before you decide to start
playing mind tricks with yourself. Always be healthy first.

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Amazon's AutoRip Gives You Free MP3s for CDs You've Purchased

Amazon has launched AutoRip, a service that gives customers free MP3 versions of CDs they've purchased anytime since 1998.
Even better, customers who purchase a new CD will receive their
digital copy before the actual, physical CD arrives at their doorstep.
"What would you say if you bought music CDs from a company 15 years
ago, and then 15 years later that company licensed the rights from the
record companies to give you the MP3 versions of those CDs ... and then
to top it off, did that for you automatically and for free? Well,
starting today, it's available to all of our customers – past, present,
and future – at no cost," said Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com founder and CEO.
AutoRip currently has some 50,000 albums in its database, with more on the way. The quality of the ripped MP3 CDs is 256 Kbps.
Users will be able to play their music through a web-based player as
well as any Cloud Player compatible device, including Android and iOS
devices, Kindle Fire, Roku, Samsung Smart TVs and Sonos.
The service is now live, and users should be able to see a notification in their Cloud Player that AutoRip is operational.

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ZTE Plans to Launch Firefox OS Smartphone in Europe in 2013

China's ZTE has teamed up with an unnamed European carrier to build a smartphone based on Firefox OS, Bloomberg reports. The companies plan to launch the device in Europe this year.
According to CEO of ZTE’s U.S. unit Cheng Lixin, the company might also launch a Firefox OS-based device in the U.S. in 2013.
“We closely monitor the ecosystem and how it evolves. If that is
ready and if consumer studies support that data, then we may launch one
in U.S. also this year,” Cheng said.
He did not disclose any additional details about the device's specifications or pricing.
Vice president of products at Mozilla Jay Sullivan confirmed the
company is working with ZTE, as well as Qualcomm and TCL on Firefox
OS-based devices.
Mozilla had announced Firefox OS in July 2012
as a fully open alternative to Android, promising first devices would
arrive in 2013. It seems they'll be on schedule, though the road ahead
is long and hard, especially since Android and iOS are quickly overtaking market share from smaller competitors. Image credit: Mozilla

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How the Mars Curiosity Rover Works

On a hopeful evening in August 2012, a roomful of NASA employees held
their breath as they watched a rover named Curiosity attempt a landing
that was no short of a miracle. After what they dubbed the "seven
minutes of terror," the control room erupted with emotion as Curiosity's wheels safely touched the surface of Mars.
Curiosity rover will drive around the Gale Crater in a mission to
determine if Mars could ever support microbial life. This information
will serve as the foundation for possible manned missions to the Red
Planet.
Curiosity — who has assumed a female personality
on NASA's social networks — is different from the any other rover to
ever land on Mars. For starters, Curiosity is 10 feet long, 7 feet tall
and five times heavier than her predecessors Spirit and Opportunity,
twin rovers that NASA launched in 2003. To put it in more tangible
terms, Curiosity is about the same size as a Mini Cooper at 1,928
pounds.
No space is wasted on the $2.5 billion Curiosity rover. She is packed
with a cutting-edge scientific payload that allows her to explore Mars
like a human would. Here is a rundown of just some of the hardware that the rover uses on the mysterious Red Planet.

How Curiosity Snaps Photos of the Red Planet

If you've kept up with the latest news about Curiosity's findings,
you have probably seen the incredible, high-res images she has beamed
from the Red Planet. The rover uses 17 different types of cameras to
snap these images — in both black and white and color — and
high-definition video.
The first camera the rover used was her Mars Decent Imager (MARDI),
which was turned on as she completed her white-knuckle descent onto the
Red Planet. The 2-megapixel wide-angle camera recorded a full-color, HD video of that landing so that we can relive those seven minutes whenever we want.
Next up on the rover is the Mars Hand Lens Imager, which captures
extremely close-up images of things like soil, rocks and ice. Mounted on
Curiosity's arm, this camera is so advanced that it can reveal details
of materials that are smaller than the width of a human hair. Curiosity
has also used this camera to snap incredible self portraits.
Built at about human-eye level, Curiosity's Mars Science Laboratory
Mast Camera takes color photos and video of the rover's surroundings.
Essentially, this camera sees what she "sees" — the Red Planet terrain
or materials collected with the rover's arm, for example. This camera
can take incredible 360-degree panoramic views of Mars by stitching together images slowly taken in a rotating circle.

The Tools Curiosity Uses to 'Do the Science'

Curiosity's suite of instruments, called Sample Analysis at Mars
(SAM), analyzes material the rover collects using her arm. All of these
tools are used to complete her ultimate mission of assessing
carbon-based molecules — the building blocks of life — on the alien
planet.
For this instrument, Curiosity will deliver powdered samples to one
of two funnels on her "back" and then to small cups for processing
inside the rover's "body." The entire box is about the size of a
microwave oven and weighs about 88 pounds.
For studying Mars' atmosphere, Curiosity has a gas chromatograph, a
mass spectrometer and a tunable laser spectrometer with combined
capabilities to identify a wide range of organic compounds and determine
the ratios of different isotopes of key elements. To identify materials
in rocks and soils, Curiosity uses an on-board an X-ray diffraction and
fluorescence instrument called CheMin.
The rover uses an instrument named ChemCam to vaporize thin layers of
material from Martian rocks or soil targets up to 23 feet away. It took
eight years for the U.S. Department of Energy's Los Alamos National
Laboratory and France's national space and research agencies to build
the ChemCam. And Curiosity didn't waste anytime before firing it. Using
30 pulses of laser for 10 seconds, Curiosity blasted her first fist-sized rock called "Coronation" in August.
The rover first used SAM in early November. NASA released the initial results of those findings at the first of December. Despite a rumor that turned out to be a major misunderstanding, those first soil samples did not contain an "earth-shaking" discovery. However, the data did show that Martian soil is a complex makeup of water, sulfur and chlorine-containing substances.

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Karbonn A21 Review

Karbonn has been making news recently with its
dual-core Android-based smartphones and the A21 is the latest entrant in
its Android smartphone line-up. The recent advertisements state that
the phone can do two jobs at a single given time, which is true to quite
an extent given that it is equipped with a dual-core processor. Well,
let's find out if the phone is really smart enough.

Design and build
The A21 from Karbonn has a great design and an aesthetically
appealing exterior. The dual-tone black and white body makes it look a
class apart and trust us, it does not feel like any of the cheap phones.
Though the handset looks classy, the chassis is made from a strong and
durable plastic with a semi-matte and glossy finish. It can get pretty
ugly looking after a bad fall or if it is not properly handled. The
edges especially are glossy and the white rear panel can get smudged
with dirty hands pretty fast. The front panel features four capacitive
buttons for Home, Menu, Back and Search along with a large 4.5-inch LCD
display. Towards the top is the earpiece and a front camera, and next to
it is a translucent window that hides the proximity and light sensors.
The rear panel sports a camera and an LED flash towards the top and a
speaker grill on the bottom. The volume rocker is placed on the right
while the power and audio jack are seen on the top. The right side has
the micro USB interface. Overall, the design looks impressive and does
sport a good look for a phone priced in the the Rs 10,000 bracket
(approximate price in the local market). Lastly, the rear panel opens up
to the battery compartment where you can see the two SIM slots and a
hot-swappable microSD card bay.

Features and performance
The A21 from Karbonn’s Duple series of smartphones features a
dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor clocked at 1.2GHz. As per our
benchmarking utilities, we found the processor running on a maximum
1.15GHz—so either the processor is underclocked for stability or the
speed of the processor is rounded-off to 1.2GHz for the spec sheet.
Coupled with the processor is an Adreno 203 graphics processor and 512MB
of RAM. Here again, as per the benchmarking apps, the information
passed out about the RAM is that 386MB is in use by the operating system
itself and the rest is available for user apps. This amount of memory
does not feel sufficient enough for a dual-core based hardware but is
good enough for casual and basic operations. The internal storage
provided is 4GB, which can be extended using a microSD card. The display
is a large 4.5-inch LCD with a resolution of 480 x 800, but all our
tests reveal a resolution of 540 x 960 pixels. A 5MP camera with an LED
flash is provided on the rear and a 1.3MP camera for video calling is
available on the front panel.

Dual-tone black and white body with glossy front and back panels

The A21 features dual SIM support, of which one is capable of 3G
while the other is 2G. So you have an option of using one SIM for the
Internet channel while the other can be used for voice calls. The
Internet can also be connected using the Wi-Fi b/g/n interface. Other
connectivity options are Bluetooth and a micro USB PC interface. A-GPS
onboard can be used for your navigation purposes. Lastly, a 1800 mAh
battery completes the phone’s specification section.

Volume rocker on the right side

Power and audio jack on the top

On the performance front, we did find the phone faster than most
single-core processor based Android phone in the market. However, after
using it for a while with a few apps and games, we did find it getting a
bit sluggish thanks to the insufficient memory provided for the user
apps, which runs out in no time if you use memory-heavy apps including a
live-wallpaper. Casual free games downloaded from the Play store would
suffice, but keep away from high-definition and GPU heavy games as they
could get sluggish in no time and you will lose out on battery life in
no time.